The drop in prices are mainly due to the fact that Nissan has moved Leaf production from Japan to Tennessee

Nissan’s Leaf just experienced a dramatic price drop, making it the cheapest five-seater electric vehicle (EV) in the U.S. At the North American International Auto Show (NAIAS), Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn said the price of the base model 2013 Leaf has been cut by $6,400. Last year’s base model went for $35,200, and now, the 2013 Leaf S will sell for $28,800 to start before a $7,500 federal tax credit (and any applicable state credit/rebate) is applied.

A couple of other Leaf models have seen a price cut as well. The Leaf SV will drop from last year’s price of $35,200 to $31,820 this year. The Leaf SL is also going from $37,250 last year to $34,840 this year.

“With nearly 50,000 Leafs on the road globally, we are the leaders in zero emissions vehicles and our class-leading product just got better,” said Billy Hayes, Global vice president of Leaf sales for Nissan. “From the very outset, Nissan has continuously advanced and refined the affordable zero emissions vehicle ownership experience. Now customers won’t have to pay a premium for owning a green car that’s really fun to drive, and that’s exciting.”

2013 Nissan Leaf

The drop in prices is mainly due to the fact that Nissan has moved Leaf production from Japan to Tennessee. It also has its lithium-ion batteries and motors manufactured there. Nissan announced that it began Leaf production at a new plant in Smyrna, Tennessee last Thursday. It will build the Leaf and gasoline vehicles in this plant, while building batteries at a separate plant next door. The plant is the result of a 2010 U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) loan for $1.4 billion. According to the DOE, Nissan can build up to 150,000 Leafs and 200,000 batteries annually at the Tennessee plants

Later, Nissan had to admit that it wasn’t going to hit its sales mark for 2012, which was 20,000 Leafs. Nissan only sold 9,819 Leafs for the whole year -- less than half of its goal, and only 1.5 percent higher than the number it sold in 2011.

No it's not. The rio had the best fuel economy so I chose it as a specific example from the list of cars under 15K. You can easily bump the price range into the 15K-20K category and still find a better deal than a leaf with better resale.If you lease any vehicle then resale is a non issue

Reliability? Leaf? Have you missed the articles about its range problems? It only has 73mile range to begin with. Chop that down because of all of the other mitigating factors and it just doesn't make any sense.

Instant torque? Really? It's a commuter car. You racing your leaf? How much torque do you need for stop light traffic?.

It's not a non-issue. It's factored into the lease rate. That's what the residual is.

Show me where you can lease a gas car and fuel it for $250/mo.

quote: Reliability? Leaf? Have you missed the articles about its range problems?

And what did these articles say about AVERAGE reliability? Nothing?

Yeah, you make plenty of sense. Comprehensive reliability statistics from Consumer Reports pale in comparison to the opinion you can form from articles with zero data...

quote: Instant torque? Really? It's a commuter car. You racing your leaf? How much torque do you need for stop light traffic?

If everyone was happy with a Rio's acceleration, then why is the average engine displacement over 3L? Of course there's value in a responsive engine. One of the biggest complaints about the Prius is its performance.

quote: Again provide me a link to where I can lease a leaf at that price!

I showed you a link up top. Your pathetic comparison with a two seater is ludicrous. Why didn't you go even further and point out a moped as an alternative to the Leaf?

quote: but range isn't a factor

When did I say it wasn't a factor? This is entirely in the context of a second car. If the Leaf's range is an issue, then you have zero chance of buying it: You don't care about price, you don't care about efficiency, and you don't care about performance, because you won't buy the car. Period.

If that's your only argument, then leave the discussion.

quote: You can continue to ignore all the articles talking about issues with the batteries if you want. I didn't realize that unless it comes from consumer reports that it just cant be real.

Toyota had issues with the pedal. Ford had issues with fire risks. Honda had issues with cars rolling away without the key. Kia had issues with air bags. This doesn't even cover 1% of issues that cars have. EVERY CAR HAS ISSUES.

What matters is average reliability. The articles you mention give zero information about that. Consumer Reports does.

"Intel is investing heavily (think gazillions of dollars and bazillions of engineering man hours) in resources to create an Intel host controllers spec in order to speed time to market of the USB 3.0 technology." -- Intel blogger Nick Knupffer